Girls Soccer Players: Chase Health First, Then Performance Follows

07 Oct Girls Soccer Players: Chase Health First, Then Performance Follows

This blog was originally published by Erica Suter on Girls Soccer Network.

Warning to girls soccer players: never sacrifice your health for performance.

Mary Cain, a pro mid-distance runner, was the fastest in the world at one point. In 2014, she won the 3,000-meter event at the Junior World Championships. She was on top of the world and one of the most successful up and coming young track athletes. Until…she was told she needed to lose weight to perform at an even higher level.

She took this to heart and while her performance got better for a moment in time, eventually her health declined, and her performance started to decline, too.

Eventually, female athletes who go to extreme, unhealthy measures for the sake of improved performance, end up losing in the end.

The body will always keep score, and performance will reach eventually diminishing returns.

There’s only so much weight to lose and fat to trim, until the body says back, ‘this is too much stress and malnutrition to handle.’ So it manifests into girls losing their periods. Or suffering stress fractures. Or suffering muscle soreness for months. Or getting nagging injuries. Or losing energy and focus during games.

How about we change the narrative and have girls chase health first?

Because when health is the priority, sport performance follows.

Words Matter

Sadly, a lot of female athletes are told to lose weight by their coaches.

Body composition does impact performance, but girls soccer players are not educated on it in a healthy and empowering a way.

They’re only told to “lose weight” which is the worst advice, since the number on the scale doesn’t tell the whole story about someone’s health and performance.

As a result, girls soccer players focus on trimming, burning, cutting fat, and losing weight. They’re fixated on the number on the scale.

The “lose weight” statement needs to be tossed in the trash, and we need to focus on building optimal body composition for each girl’s individual genetics, height, and body type.

Body Composition > Weight on the Scale

Instead of a looking at a meaningless number on the scale, girls soccer players should start focusing on building a robust body composition.

Body composition is the make up of muscle mass and bone (fat free mass) as well as fat mass. It impacts performance because the stronger the muscles, bones, and ligaments, the stronger a girls soccer player is to handle the increasing demands of training and competition.

With fat mass, it’s important female athletes work toward a fat mass percentage that yes, keeps them explosive and supple and on the field, but not get a fat mass percentage too low, otherwise this hinders overall health. In fact, when female athletes under eat and get too low in essential body fat, they are at risk for menstrual disorders as well as musculoskeletal injuries.

Girls must chase more muscle, more strength, strong and durable bones, and their joints, namely the knee and the itty bitty ACL ligament will be much more protected.

Coming back to the “losing weight” comment, it doesn’t help female athletes focus on robustness.

We want to focus on adding, not subtracting, when it comes to body composition:

– Adding more protein to our meals
– Adding more healthy fats and Omega 3s
– Adding more carbohydrates rich in nutrients (fruits, veggies, raw honey)
– Adding more calories
– Adding more weights in the gym
– Adding more speed work
– Adding more muscle
– Adding recovery days so bodies can repair and build up

When we put the focus back on adding rather than subtracting, we empower female athletes to chase a body composition that improves both health and performance.

One last thing on the body composition front: every girl will have a different fat free mass and fat percentage optimal for her. This depends on body type, how tall she is, and her genetics.

One girl may thrive at 16% body fat, while another may be her best at 18%. There is no universal ideal body comp for everyone across the board. Always keep your eyes on your own paper.

Looks Are Deceiving

Just because someone is super thin, doesn’t mean they’re epitome of health.

Luckily, we have moved away from the days when magazine covers promoted super skinny. We sure have made progress, but we still aren’t keeping in mind that ALL looks are deceiving. Whether a body is skinny, in between, or obese, we have no clue what is going on internally.

It’s critical for female athletes to yes, chase a robust and strong body composition, but they must check in with their internal health, too.

How can girls soccer players know they have a body composition that is healthy and high performing?

Here are some subjective measures to check in on first:

Menstrual: is it regular? Does your period come on time most of the time, and is it relatively pain free? This is a vital sign of good female health.

Mindset: is your mood stable most of the time?

Muscle: are your weight room or performance numbers continuing to improve gradually over time, or have you declined in performance? Are you slowing down on the field?

Motivation: are you motivated and excited to play soccer still? Motivation gives us a clue if we are burned out or not.

Feelings are a good start to checking in on our health, but if there’s any lingering fatigue, headaches, or PMS symptoms, or reoccurring injuries that shouldn’t be happening, then adolescent and college girls soccer players should consider having these labs ordered from their primary care physician:

Full Metabolic Panel
Vitamin D
Vitamin B12 and Folate
Iron and Ferratin
C Reactive Protein
Hemoglobin A1C
Thyroid panel – TSH, T3 and T4
Hormonal panel, Testosterone, Estrogen, Progesterone

When one or more of these is drastically out of range, then there are underlying health issues, namely, nutritional deficiencies, blood sugar issues, hormonal imbalances and chronic inflammation.

When girls soccer players are deficient in nutrients or have hormonal imbalances, performance will suffer, whether it manifests as fatigue, slowing of speed and agility, less focus and awareness, bone injuries, or other soft tissue injuries.

We’ve had it backwards for a long time, and many girls were chasing performance at the expense of their health.

Health First, Performance Follows

So try chasing health first. See what happens when you nourish your body. See what happens when you stay hydrated. See what happens when you eat nutrient dense proteins. See what happens when you fuel and not starve. See what happens when you strength train. See what happens when you embrace muscle mass.

Now emboldened from your new training and nutrition habits, you’re at the pinnacle of your health. And because of this, your sport performance is at its apex, too.

Chase health first, then your performance will follow.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Erica Suter is a former college 3x All-American soccer player from Johns Hopkins University. She is giving back to the game and to female soccer players as a full-time performance coach. She holds a Master of Science in Exercise Science and has been helping girls with speed, agility, strength, and conditioning for over 12 years in the ECNL, GA, and NPL.

Her players have gone on to play college soccer at UNC, University of Maryland, Pittsburgh, University of Souther California, University of Detroit, Mercy, Northwestern, Eastern Carolina University, West Point, University of South Florida, University of Charleston, MIT, Johns Hopkins, Carnegie Mellon, Rutgers, Towson University, and more.

Get her book FEMALE ATHLETE HIGH PERFORMANCE

Follow Erica on Instagram: @fitsoccerqueen

Check out her podcast: The Soccer Queens Podcast